NHL
NHL Playoffs
WINNIPEG — Heading into Game 7, the Winnipeg Jets faced many questions about the value of their season.
What could 82 games spent setting records, winning the Presidents’ Trophy and achieving myriad personal milestones mean if the Jets still couldn’t make it out of the first round? Could an entire year really mean nothing if Game 7 slipped away?
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What a hollow feeling that would have been. What an empty emotion, going from the roar of Canada Life Centre — the thousands of fans gasping at every shot attempt, cheering every hit, and collectively exhaling every time the puck left a St. Louis Blues player’s stick and landed somewhere safe — to nothingness. To the silence and doubts. To all those nagging questions that never seemed to go away.
The Jets showed their value in the dying seconds of Game 7. With a 4-3 double overtime win over the Blues, they gave meaning to an entire season’s effort.
They spent the year telling us, showing us and telling us again that they were a more resilient group — that they had built their scar tissue, learned their lessons and proven to each other that they’d be there in the biggest moments. It was a season set to be defined by its playoffs from the moment the puck dropped, but the Jets told us — ad nauseum — that they would focus only on the present moment, whether it was the next practice, the next shift or the next play.
Winnipeg put together the worst possible start to Game 7. Jordan Kyrou torched through the neutral zone, broke through poor Jets coverage, and scored on St. Louis’ first shot of the game. Six minutes and six seconds later, Mathieu Joseph made it 2-0 on the Blues’ fourth shot, heaping more doubt upon Connor Hellebuyck’s playoff reputation. Josh Morrissey had already been hurt once in the game on an Oskar Sundqvist hit, but was injured trying to hit Joseph before his 2-0 goal. It was the last action of Morrissey’s series. The Jets were down to five defencemen just seven minutes in.
But it was only the beginning of an all-time classic Game 7.
Every second still left on the clock is another moment to turn a game, a series, or even the narrative about a franchise around. The story of a team is defined by a series of moments — little actions chained together over time, such that they add up into something more.
Vladislav Namestnikov had missed two Grade-A chances in the second period as the Jets pushed to turn Game 7 into a competition. He’d only scored 11 goals all season, but kept pushing. With two minutes left in the third period, Alex Iafallo, Adam Lowry and Nino Niederreiter battled to recover Namestnikov’s missed shot. Dylan Samberg kept Brayden Schenn’s clearing attempt in at the line. And Namestnikov changed his story — and his team’s — when he fired a cross-ice pass that bounced off of Ryan Suter and past Binnington.
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It gave Cole Perfetti’s goal the chance to make history. The Jets didn’t even dress Perfetti in four out of five playoff games last year, but on Sunday, he willed them to overtime with almost no time left on the clock.
Consider how many tiny, individual actions work in concert to create a massive moment that every Jets fan will remember.
Namestnikov’s goal made it 3-2 with 1:56 left, the clock ticking and the Jets’ season slipping away. Gabriel Vilardi won the ensuing faceoff, but it took the Jets almost a minute to get back into the Blues’ zone. That’s when Vilardi boxed out Cam Fowler, Nikolaj Ehlers spun a pass to Perfetti in front, and Perfetti kept fighting for a goal with second- and third-effort pushes on Binnington’s pad. He came so close that the NHL initiated a lengthy video review, giving Winnipeg a chance to rest its big guns in a final push to save its season.
The Blues won the next two faceoffs, but Pavel Buchnevich missed Winnipeg’s empty net from 150 feet away.
Still, the Jets pushed, recovering a puck and dumping it in with 25 seconds left in the game. Justin Faulk got the puck first, but Kyle Connor knocked down his attempt to clear it. Colton Parayko tried to rim the puck out, but Ehlers kept it in at the line. When Ehlers’ shot hit Robert Thomas, all three of Lowry, Vilardi and Perfetti converged upon Thomas to win it back. Then came the miracle.
There were seven seconds left in Winnipeg’s season when Ehlers fanned on his next shot, and five seconds left in the Jets’ record-setting year when Lowry made yet another play to get the puck back to Ehlers at the point. There were four seconds left when Ehlers fired this puck to Connor across the ice, and three seconds left when Connor whipped it into the slot.
That’s when Perfetti’s goal saved Winnipeg’s season.
WITH 1.6 SECONDS TO GO. 🤯
COLE PERFETTI‼️ pic.twitter.com/kgZU95vurH
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 5, 2025
Perfetti scored the latest tying goal in Game 7 NHL history. In doing so, he changed Jets history, giving Lowry the chance to complete the comeback in double overtime.
“It’s euphoric. It’s emotional. It’s motivating,” Connor said. “We used that in overtime.”
Overtime should have been the Blues’ to win. The Jets’ five healthy defencemen should have been too tired to keep them in it. Pionk and Samberg played over 40 minutes each, making them the first defencemen to cross that threshold in a Game 7 since Chris Pronger and Al MacInnis in 1999. Meanwhile, Dylan DeMelo played 36:40, Haydn Fleury played 33:02, and Luke Schenn played 27:49 — almost double their ordinary workloads. Nathan Walker hit the post early in overtime, but the Jets carried the flow of play, outshooting St. Louis 19-9 in the extra 36 minutes and 10 seconds of action.
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It was apropos that Lowry won it — off his shinpad, at that — after Pionk fired the puck off Sundqvist and toward the net.
“I probably dreamt it was a little nicer than just going off my leg, but it’s one of those things, on the outdoor rink, in the driveway, you dream about being the hero in a Game 7 and giving yourself a chance to continue chasing a Stanley Cup,” Lowry said. “To do it in Winnipeg at home — we have such tremendous fans, such tremendous support, just really happy we get to continue playing in front of them.”
NEVER IN DOUBT pic.twitter.com/NC8RQZTGKb
— Winnipeg Jets (@NHLJets) May 5, 2025
“We gave it everything we had, down to the last second,” Perfetti said after the series ended.
“We didn’t like our start (but) how are you going to respond? What are you going to do?” Connor said.
“We looked at each other and said, ‘We’re not done playing hockey yet.’ It was special,” said Ehlers.
“I’m just really proud of the guys,” Lowry said. “You get down 2-0, Game 7, it kind of feels like it’s an insurmountable lead when it’s 3-1, late. But to score two with the goalie out and to just have life … And for Fetts to bring the building to its feet with (three) seconds left is incredible.”
The legacy of a Game 7 double-overtime win is that of glory.
Every round a team wins as a collective inflates the big-game reputations of the people involved. Hellebuyck had a miserable series, but he dug in, locked things down and won Game 7. Namestnikov was the second-line centre the Jets wanted to improve upon with Brock Nelson, but Namestnikov scored two goals in the playoffs and Nelson scored none. Fleury was a depth signing capable of NHL or AHL duty; now he’s a Game 7 performer who earns praise from his coach.
Results drive those storylines, even after a single series win. The Jets are free now; it took every second of Game 7, but they’ve consolidated their 82-game regular-season excellence. The Dallas Stars await, starting on Wednesday, and should prove to be an even bigger test than St. Louis. But let’s take a look at those lingering questions surrounding the Jets.
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They weren’t supposed to be able to overcome a poor start, especially after a playoff loss. Hellebuyck wasn’t supposed to be able to stop the implosion, especially after giving up another early goal. No, this year’s Jets weren’t supposed to be frauds, but they certainly would have been discussed as such if they lost. And I don’t think many people would have picked the Jets to win Game 7 without Mark Scheifele or Morrissey — but this time, the Jets came through.
“Even down 3-1, there was no doubt,” Perfetti said. “We had belief in one another and belief that we were going to come back. I’m just so proud of this group and so proud to be a part of it.”
One interesting footnote: Many of the players who factored in on the comeback win also made costly mistakes. Connor lost his coverage on the Blues’ first goal and gave the puck away on the second. Ehlers mishandled a pass in the neutral zone, leading to Radek Faksa’s 3-1 goal, and fought the puck again on the shift before making his inspired pass to Connor for Perfetti to tie it. Lowry had an empty net to shoot at in the third period, but found his shot blocked by Philip Broberg. Even Pionk, whose three assists and 46 minutes exemplify Winnipeg’s perseverance as well as anyone in Game 7, started to wear down as overtime wore on. And in every single case, the Jets kept pushing.
Would Winnipeg’s regular-season success really have meant nothing if Game 7 slipped away?
Thanks to one of the most dramatic double-overtime comebacks in NHL history, that’s one question Winnipeg doesn’t have to answer.
(Photo: Cameron Bartlett / Getty Images)
Murat Ates blends modern hockey analysis with engaging storytelling as a staff writer for The Athletic NHL based in Winnipeg. Murat regularly appears on Winnipeg Sports Talk and CJOB 680 in Winnipeg and on podcasts throughout Canada and the United States. Follow Murat on Twitter @WPGMurat
